Stop Giving Airtime to Crackpots

In my write up concerning the Grady High creationism flap, I mentioned two recent happenings in the UK:  "UK bans teaching of creationism in any school that receives public funding" and "BBC staff told to stop inviting cranks on to science programmes."   While researching another story currently in the works, I came across the attached Phil Plait article in which he made two interesting points in response to the UK news.

The first deals with creating a "false balance" when "the science being discussed was solidly understood."  (A point that was also mentioned and discussed in chat during the most recent Atheist On Air episode.)  Plait was specifically echoing the BBC news decision when he said:

But more broadly, most TV news shows do this, especially when they are done with a talk show format. It’s all too easy for a news program or other venue with a biased ideological objective (cough cough Fox News cough Wall Street Journal cough) to bring on people who sound authoritative, but who are in fact simply cranks or contrarians with outlandish claims. This sort of bias sows doubt, which is far easier to do than to debunk it.

The second point, what really got my attention, in the Plait article was this: "In other subjects, it’s possible for honest people with different values to come down on different sides of a debate. But when it comes to science, especially firmly established and consensually agreed-upon science, putting on some crackpot who disagrees is not 'fair and balanced.'”

"[F]irmly established and consensually agreed-upon science,,,."

"[C]onsensually agreed-upon? 

Ding, Ding, Ding!! You mean science isn't a democracy?

For the most part my science blogging deals with countering creationism and the ideology behind it, as I have been "researching" and writing about it since forever.  But lately, as the stupid smart people seem to be falling out of the sky, I have gotten sucked into other science issues.  What I have discovered, there is a commonality amongst the crazies.  Whether it be anti-evolution, climate change deniers or anti-vaxxers, they all hold the unsupported belief that science is wrong or it is a vast conspiracy of false information to confuse then control the masses.

Steve Newton explains it in this way,

What it boils down to is that creationists and climate change deniers both reject central principles of science on ideological, religious and political grounds. Moreover, they deny not just these principles, but also the idea of science itself as a way of knowing about the world.

Attacks on evolution and climate science are both based on the rejection of well-established scientific techniques. Geologists demonstrate the age of the Earth with the techniques of radiometric dating. “Bunk,” say young-Earth creationists: These techniques rely on unproven assumptions. Climate scientists develop complex computer models as a technique to understand what might happen to future climates. “Bunk,” say climate change deniers: Such models are just a convenient fiction.

Where both are going wrong, however, is in failing to understand that the techniques they dismiss as bunk are part and parcel of the standard scientific toolbox. It’s not just geochronology that assumes the constancy of radioactive decay rates, and it’s not just climatology that deploys computer models to understand complex systems: These are principles and methods that work throughout the sciences, not just the areas under attack. Whether they realize it or not, climate change deniers and evolution deniers are committed to rejecting basic methodologies accepted by scientists across the disciplines.

Having failed to convince the scientific community of the credibility of their views, both creationists and climate change deniers have taken their case to the public in a way that distorts and misrepresents the nature of science.

Just something to think about that the next time you pop an antibiotic in your mouth,,,eh, eh think about it for a moment m'ok?

Stop Giving Airtime to Crackpots